Mastering Money

Mastering Money is hosted by Certified Income Specialist™ Steve Jurich. Steve's comments have been seen on MarketWatch, CNBC.com, Bloomberg, and TheStreet.com. Steve is joined on most days by Money Radio favorite Sinclair Noe as well as experts and authors from the world of Wall Street and real estate. New episodes published every weekday at 9am PST. Listen every weekday to get a handle on emerging market trends, asset allocation strategies, social security, medicare, RMD planning, tax strategies, estate planning, annuities, life insurance and more!

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Are you using the "backdoor Roth IRA?" IRS income limits forbid many Money Radio listeners from contributing directly to a Roth. The back door Roth is a way to accomplish the task and build a tax free nest egg--if you meet certain requirements and don't screw it up! Steve and Sinclair discuss and review. In the Q & A, CFP® Murray Titterington with IQ Wealth answers questions on Social Security claiming and ex spouses.

For business owners, a defined benefit plan can result in tax deductions and retirement funding of from $100,000 to $300,000 annually, depending on which type of plan is selected. There are also "Roth-like" alternatives with more flexibility, and ways of combining several plans at once, while keeping complexity low. Steve and Sinclair review the options. In the Q & A Segment, highly rated commercial real estate attorney Christopher McNichol of the Gust Rosenfeld law firm joins the A-Team, and digs into community property issues.

Big pharma is making a comeback with cutting edge new drugs to do battle with alzheimers, diabetes, various forms of vaccines, oncology, and acute hospital care. Meanwhile, the Food and Drug Administration has speeded approval of drugs. The agency approved 41 new drugs last year, the most in 18 years, and well above the average of 25 per year since 2005.

Earlier this year Merck lost its remaining patent protection on Remicade, an arthritis drug and its third biggest seller. By 2017, it will lose protection on the cholesterol drugs Zetia, its No. 2 seller, and Vytorin. In total, about $9.5 billion, or 22% of the company’s $42 billion in 2014 revenue, could be in jeopardy through 2017. However, it has developed new drugs that could be blockbusters. Sinclair and Steve review some fascinating stats on pharmaceutical breakthroughs. Jordan Goodman, author of Barron's financial dictionary and formerly with Money Magazine, joins the A Team for a spirited Q & A.

Bull markets make geniuses of all investors. Professionals know the challenge involved in not only making money, but keeping it. The speed at which you can click buy or sell on an ETF can give a false sense of security. Unforced errors cost investors lots of money and experts say we are all wired to screw up investments for a list of reasons they have identified. Steve and Sinclair review the research of Dr. Meir Statman, author of What Investors Really Want, and a professor of Finance at Santa Clara University. Neil MacNeil of the 2 For 1 Stock Split Newsletter, featured on MarketWatch, joins the A-Team for the Q & A segment.

Are you ready to ride in a driver-less taxi? Uber thinks you are. After raising $5 billion from investors, the ride sharing juggernaut now wants to dump the taxi drivers and go driverless. In a mad dash to be the firstest with the mostest in driverless taxi's, Uber hired away the top robotics scientists from Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh. Steve and Sinclair review the controversy reported in the Wall Street Journal. CFP® Murray Titterington with IQ Wealth joins the A-Team to talk about Social Security strategies and using software to arrive at the optimal approach.

Water water everywhere, but not a drop to drink. The debate rages on whether California should invest the billion dollars per plant it will take to provide drinking water from the Pacific. IDE Technologies of Israel has built 400 plants over four decades and has refined the techniques, lowered the cost per gallon, and reduced environmental impact. Carlsbad and San Diego are now players, will LA and San Francisco follow suit? Critics site the cost as being high, yet Californians are ready to build a football stadium to attract an NFL team. The last one built, Dallas Cowboy Stadium (AT&T) cost $1.2 billion. You can build a plant that will cover the water needs for a city the size of Los Angeles with that kind of money. Matt Griffin of Payson Petroleum joins us for the Q & A on Mastering Money.

Buying a home this summer or know someone who is? You might want to close prior to August 1, when a new batch of red tape arrives, courtesy of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. It could affect the length of time it takes to close by up to 10 days, lock expirations, and more. Steve and Sinclair review an update by Daniel Goldstein of MarketWatch. In the Q & A segment, Sinclair quizzes Steve on an annuity that offers a 20% bonus to the income and death benefit base.

Have you heard about the retirement programs known as the "770 Account" or "Bank on Yourself", which can result in tax free income in retirement that may rival many other investments? They are heavily marketed on the internet, yet are simply marketing nicknames for what is known as "Overfunded" or "Max Funded" cash value life insurance. IQ Wealth is an authority and primary resource for these types of policies. Many U.S. banks utilize max funded life policies for a part of their cash reserves. In fact, American banks like Bank of American, Wells Fargo, Chase, and Citi owned a combined $130 billion in this asset which is secure, safe, and can be used for cash access with tax deferral when not taking withdrawals. Steve and Sinclair review it in Segment 2. In segment 3, the Q & A segment, gold expert Nick Grovich of American Federated joins the A-Team.

History can mess up your investments, according to Morgan Housel of the Motley Fool. Using history as your only screen for investments is dangerous, and dangerous is expensive in the investment world. What starts as an honest attempt to objectively study the past quickly becomes a field day of confirming your existing beliefs. Psychologists call it Confirmation Bias, and we all suffer from it. Think stocks are expensive? History agrees. Think stocks are cheap? History agrees. Think tax cuts spur economic growth? History agrees. You can win any economic argument you want using a version of history, written somewhere. You just need to be the last person on the podium. Interesting insights on Mastering Money today. In the Q & A segment, IQ Wealth CFP® Murray Titterington, formerly with Morgan Stanley and Merrill Lynch, joins the A-Team to talk Social Security.

The global bond market is estimated at well over $60 trillion dollars nearly twice the size of the global stock markets. If you've been trying to figure out why US Treasury bonds have been rising in rate (and falling in value, causing losses in bond funds), guess what? It has to do with an unprecedented intrusion into world wide bond trading by automated hedge funds known as CTAs. They are algorithmically set, and when the setting is wrong, an mass covering of position is required. Steve and Sinclair review information from several sources reported in the Wall Street Journal. Matt Griffin of Payson Petroleum joins the A-Team for the Q & A on world oil prices.